You finally ditched that toxic relationship and escaped their constant cycle of abuse. You’ve escaped their constant criticism, gaslighting, verbal abuse, intimidation and all those other things they subjected you to. But they left you with one final twisted “gift” — emotional bluntness. After years of having your feelings invalidated, minimized, and straight-up crushed by their cruelty, you shut down. Feeling nothing became your survival mechanism in that messed up relationship.

At first, the numbness or feeling detached helped you survive their surge of verbal abuse, stonewalling, and manipulation. You couldn’t let the constant dismissal of your emotions and gaslighting burn you anymore, so you just…went emotionally numb or emotionless. You formed this protective shield and let their words slide over off you without ‘causing pain. However, even with this shield, some of the pain still lingers inside. You may not show it on the outside, but the hurt is still there just waiting for the moments to reveal itself.

And here’s the harsh truth — that handy coping mechanism doesn’t just switch off once you’ve left your narc behind. Your brain got so used to shutting down emotionally as a defense, that it kept that emotional bluntness on lockdown, even after you made your escape. Suddenly, the very thing that helped you endure their torture is now holding you back from feeling joy, passion, excitement — any real emotion at all.

You find yourself just going through the motions, feeling disconnected and detached from life. Activities you once loved just leave you like meh, I just want to sleep or I will skive it for today. You’re present physically, but emotionally checked out. And it’s a vicious cycle — the more you get used to feeling nothing, the more comfortably numb you become. Your mind clings to this emotionless state as the new normal way of existing but in turn it’s keeping your stuck with the past pain which need to be processed.

https://biiedwin.gumroad.com/l/BreakingChains

So, when you become emotionally blunt, you might protect yourself from pain, but you also miss out on the simple joys of life. For example, you might not be able to enjoy a genuine, hearty laugh. It’s like being a stone — stones don’t laugh or feel joy; they just stay still and unchanging. Similarly, if you become too emotionally detached, you might not feel happiness or excitement as easily as before.

If this kind of emptiness sounds brutally familiar, I’ve got some tough love for you: snapping out of it won’t be easy, but it’s 100% necessary for true healing. As tempting as it is to stay robotically unfeeling to avoid potential pain, that’s no way to truly live. You’ve got to rip off that emotional should you forged for survival, no matter how daunting it may seem. In simple terms, it means facing and dealing with the painful experiences and emotions you’ve been avoiding or hiding away. Instead of ignoring them or pushing them aside, you confront them head-on. Hiding or avoiding doesn’t serve you now and it’s just holding you back in the world of suffering.

This is the hard, courageous inner work of confronting the the fears, wounds and distorted beliefs about yourself that narcissistic abuse or your past relationships ingrained. It’s releasing all the bottled-up hurt, grief, anger and shame you had to deaden to cope with those hurtful environments. It’s relearning that you’re worthy of feeling the full spectrum of human emotion and that you can handle both the joy and feeling of sadness without the need of shielding yourself forever, not just existing as an empty shell for safety.

Look, I get it’s an overwhelming prospect to crack that protective shell after it served you so dutifully for years and years. But true freedom, bliss and feeling alive on the other side is worth struggling through the inner darkness to reach it. Grass is much greener once you break that shield that’s stopping you from seeing it. You don’t have to let those hurt people still have a grip of your life even long after you’ve physically left them.

You deserve a life of joy, peace, and freedom. Who said you need to break this protective wall alone? You can definitely seek help and find that safe space to process the emotions, and it’s not as hard as you might think. It gets harder when you dwell on it. You can’t go far if you’re seeking a solution using the same mind that’s keeping you imprisoned. I’m here to cheer you on. You can do this. Others have done it, and I’ve also helped others break free from this. Happy healing.

Note from the Author

If you’re ready and you’d like my help with healing, finding peace in life and breaking free from these toxic patterns, then you can book a FREE BREAKTHROUGH CALL with me HERE. Happy healing 💙💙. Feel free to share and comment! Use this information with caution, it comes from my own thoughts & bias, experiences and research😊.